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Democrats Tag

What's one to do when it looks like the midterms aren't going their way? Stealing Republican lawn signs is always an option, as long as you don't get caught. One Delaware Democrat wasn't so lucky. Thomas Lifson of American Thinker provides this stunning yet funny report:
Dem state senator's husband busted while stealing GOP lawn signs The Democrats have become the win-by-cheating party, so much so that the President of the United States jokes about vote fraud to a party rally, just as he joked about using the IRS to punish his political opponents. Just as a fish rots from the head down, so too does a political party that depends on the votes of ineligible aliens and that fights tooth-and-nail against the sort of voter identification measures common in other advanced (and not-so-advanced) democracies. The ethos, one that predates Obama by a century or more, has filtered down to the local level, for instance a contest for the Delaware State Senate (hat tip: The Blaze). In the town of Middletown, GOP lawn signs bearing the slogan “Fix the Economy! Vote Republican” had been disappearing, so GOP volunteers set up a surveillance operation and caught the miscreant, who happened to be the husband of an incumbent state senator, one Sen. Bethany Hall-Long.
The sting was caught on video and here it is:

This is just another case of Democrats doing something they would be outraged about if Republicans tried it. In this instance, they want to use the power of government to silence opposition. Paul Bedard of the Washington Examiner reports:
Dems on FEC move to regulate Internet campaigns, blogs, Drudge In a surprise move late Friday, a key Democrat on the Federal Election Commission called for burdensome new rules on Internet-based campaigning, prompting the Republican chairman to warn that Democrats want to regulate online political sites and even news media like the Drudge Report. Democratic FEC Vice Chair Ann M. Ravel announced plans to begin the process to win regulations on Internet-based campaigns and videos, currently free from most of the FEC’s rules. “A reexamination of the commission’s approach to the internet and other emerging technologies is long over due,” she said. The power play followed a deadlocked 3-3 vote on whether an Ohio anti-President Obama Internet campaign featuring two videos violated FEC rules when it did not report its finances or offer a disclosure on the ads. The ads were placed for free on YouTube and were not paid advertising.
This is all about the accumulation and retention of power. As John Hinderaker of Powerline recently noted, that's just how the left rolls:

It's remarkable to watch Democrats scrambling to get away from Obama just six years after they and the media declared the death of the GOP. The latest example comes from Josh Kraushaar of National Journal:
Senate Democratic Officials Start Lashing Out at White House The relationship between the White House and Senate Democrats hit a new low Tuesday evening after the administration's press office released a transcript of first lady Michelle Obama's appearance in Iowa on behalf of Democratic Senate candidate Bruce Braley. The problem: The subject line of the e-mail referred to Braley as the "Democratic candidate for governor." The botch came after the first lady repeatedly referred to the Democratic Senate nominee as "Bruce Bailey" in a campaign appearance earlier this month—and it took an attendee in the crowd to correct her mistake... Indicating the sensitivity of the mistake, top Senate Democratic officials wasted no time lashing out at the Obama administration's political team in response, suggesting it was acting like a junior varsity operation two weeks before the midterms. The slipup comes one day after President Obama told Rev. Al Sharpton on his radio show that Senate Democrats keeping their distance from him are still "folks who vote with me. They have supported my agenda in Congress." That alarmed Senate Democrats up for reelection this November, most of whom are working hard to distance themselves from an unpopular president. "The ineptitude of the White House political operation has sunk from annoying to embarrassing," one senior Senate Democratic aide told National Journal. Another Senate official told the Washington Post that Obama's comments were "not devised with any input from Senate leadership."
The problem for Democrats is Obama's ego. He just can't stand not being part of the story.

We're a month away from the midterm election that could hand control of the Senate to Republicans. As with any election, there are lots of moving parts and no one is absolutely sure what's going to happen. Even so, Alexander Bolton of The Hill is reporting that panicked Democrats are already blaming each other for an expected loss:
Democrats start to point fingers Democrats are starting to play the blame game as they face the possibility of losing the Senate in November. Tempers are running high a month out from Election Day, with polls showing Democratic candidates trailing in the crucial battleground states that will decide whether control of Congress flips to Republicans. The behind-the-scenes tension broke into the open last week when former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) questioned Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) decision not to endorse Democrat Rick Weiland in South Dakota’s Senate race. Pro-immigrant advocacy groups, meanwhile, are saying Democrats should not blame them if Latino voters don’t turn up to the polls on Election Day. They say President Obama made a tactical blunder by postponing an executive order easing deportations.

Some Democrats are running for election or re-election this November but all Democrats are running as fast as they can from Obama. For his part, the president isn't doing them any favors. In a speech at Northwestern University yesterday, Obama tied himself and his deeply unpopular policies directly to the Democratic Party and the 2014 elections. Chris Cillizza of the Washington Post reported:
28 words that Democrats really wish President Obama didn’t say today Here are the four sentences that will draw all of the attention (they come more than two thirds of the way through the speech): "I am not on the ballot this fall. Michelle’s pretty happy about that. But make no mistake: these policies are on the ballot. Every single one of them." Boil those four sentences down even further and here's what you are left with: "Make no mistake: these policies are on the ballot. Every single one of them." You can imagine Sen. Mark Pryor of Arkansas or Sen. Kay Hagan in North Carolina or Alison Lundergan Grimes in Kentucky grimacing when they heard those 28 words. That trio has spent much of the campaign insisting that this election is NOT about Barack Obama, that it is instead about a choice between themselves and their opponents.

With the midterms approaching and Obama's approval rating in the gutter, vulnerable Democrats are avoiding any discussion of one particular subject. Obama. Colby Itkowitz of the Washington Post has the story:
These days, Democrats aren’t talking much about Obama in congressional speeches When President Obama took office in 2009, congressional Democrats were euphoric. With control of the House, Senate and the White House, and high public approval for their new party standard bearer, Democrats eagerly embraced Obama and all the long-awaited policy initiatives he’d surely help them achieve. In that first month, congressional Democrats mentioned Obama during floor speeches 200 or so more times than Republicans. In the next year and a half, the parties referred to the president at similar rates, sometimes with the Republicans having more to say, other times the Democrats. One can reasonably assume that when the Democrats speak of the president publicly it’s in a favorable way and when Republicans do it’s, well, not quite as glowing. As positive public opinion of Obama began to dip after his first year, the spread between how often Republicans and the Democrats invoked Obama grew wider. Put simply, the Democrats weren’t mentioning Obama by name nearly as much as Republicans.
How could this be?

Just when you thought that the IRS scandal couldn't get any worse, the editors of Investor's Business Daily have a new bombshell to offer. It seems the Department of Justice has been working with Maryland Democrat Elijah Cummings, but not to uncover the truth:
DOJ Working With Elijah Cummings To Protect The IRS An aide to the attorney general accidentally calls the office of the House Oversight Committee chairman, asking for help in spinning the defense of the agency whose head just said they obey the law when they can. We have commented many times of the all-too-cozy relationship between the IRS and Democratic members of the House and Senate, with members writing to the agency demanding that specific conservative groups and political action committees they find particularly irritating be subject to the "special scrutiny" that the Tea Party and other conservative and religious groups were subjected to in the ongoing scandal. Of particular interest to us has been Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., ranking member on Rep. Darrell Issa's House Government Reform and Oversight Committee, who has made every effort to keep the committee from finding out the true extent of IRS corruption and abuse of power in its targeting of conservatives...

Former house speaker Nancy Pelosi recently sat down for an interview with Bill Maher in which they discussed the upcoming mid-term elections. Based on Pelosi's choice of words, it sounds like the Democratic Party is expecting big losses. Chuck Ross of the Daily Caller has the details:
Nancy Pelosi: Civilization ‘In Jeopardy’ If GOP Takes Senate On the one hand, California U.S. Rep. Nancy Pelosi claims that Democrats are not “fear-mongers;” on the other hand, she believes civilization is doomed if Republicans take control of the Senate from Democrats in November. The former speaker of the House made those dramatic, incongruous statements on “Real Time with Bill Maher,” which aired live from Washington, D.C. Friday. Maher asked Pelosi about recent polling which shows that the GOP is likely to take over the upper chamber and asked, given gridlock in Washingon, why it matters that Democrats keep control. “It would be very important for the Democrats to retain control of the Senate,” Pelosi told Maher. “Civilization as we know it today would be in jeopardy if the Republicans win the Senate.”
Here's the video:

Protesting the Iraq War under President Bush was a cottage industry for Democrats, even though they voted for it. But now that Obama's hand has been forced, Democrats are doing their best to lend cautious support. Kristina Wong of The Hill describes the liberal predicament:
Left frets over Iraq mission creep The president's expansion of the U.S. military mission in Iraq is conjuring up two dirty little words for anti-war Democrats: Mission creep. Just two months ago, when Obama announced he was going to send up to 300 American troops to Iraq, he emphasized that they would only have an advisory, non-combat role. On Friday, however, U.S. fighters bombed terrorist targets in northern Iraq. Hours before, the president had announced he was authorizing such strikes as well as the airdropping of aid to Iraqi refugees stranded on a mountaintop. The White House has stressed that the two missions — the airstrikes and the airdrops — are narrow and discrete. But neither has an end-date, prompting concern from some Democrats and liberal anti-war groups. “I oppose open-ended military commitments, which the president’s actions in Iraq could become,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee. “I am deeply concerned that these actions could lead to prolonged direct military involvement, which I would strongly oppose,” he added. Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.), another senior Democrat on the committee, said he supported the president’s actions, but “as one of only 23 senators who opposed the war in Iraq, I do not believe this should be an extended campaign involving US ground troops.”
Even Elizabeth Warren has been forced to make a statement on the subject. Naturally, she supports Obama's decision.

This has been a particularly troubling week for Democrats' bad behavior on display for the public. First, as Professor Jacobson reported yesterday, a plagiarizing national Democrat politician had to step aside (no, not Joe Biden). But Walsh is just the tip of the iceberg for Democrats this week. Probably the most shocking and disturbing behavior was from Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-MD) who is the second most powerful Democrat in Congress.
House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer made an attempt at humor over his title Wednesday by telling an audience at the U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit that he does not “whip people.” “First of all, let me tell my friends from Africa, I do not whip people,” the Maryland Democrat told the crowd, receiving muffled laughs. “And if you watch ‘House of Cards,’ it is not accurate.” Wednesday’s event, titled “Dialogue with African CEOs,” was hosted by the Congressional Black Caucus, The Daily Caller reported. Mr. Hoyer’s speech covered initiatives meant to boost economic growth in Africa.
Imagine, if you will, if the House Republican Whip had made such a joke. MSNBC would be having a serious of aneurysms and Think Progress would have the torches and pitchforks out for the next six months. But the Hoyer "joke" hasn't made the mainstream media at all. Shocking, right?

Before the 2008 election, many liberals insisted that if Obama didn't win it would be because America is a racist country. Now that Obama has won two presidential elections and almost a decade has passed, many liberals are still insisting that America is a hotbed of racism. In fact, according to a new report from Alexandra Jaffee of The Hill, Democrats are planning to run on racism in the 2014 midterms:
Democrats push race issues Democrats are injecting race into the 2014 midterm elections amid fears that a drop-off in minority voters could severely cost them at the polls this fall. Democratic leaders in Congress and administration officials have suggested GOP opposition to policies ranging from immigration reform to ObamaCare are, at least partly, motivated by race. More broadly, they’ve suggested conservative Tea Party criticism of President Obama is based on the fact that he is black. Democrats reject charges that the rhetoric is a concerted political calculation on their part as they try to retain their Senate majority and make gains in the House. “You turn out voters by demonstrating your past performance and what you’re promising to do for a constituent in the future,” said Rep. G.K. Butterfield (D-N.C), a member of the Congressional Black Caucus. “I don’t call that race-baiting. I call that a political platform.”

It's just a given that Hillary Clinton will get the Democratic nomination if she runs in 2016 but last week must be giving some Democrats second thoughts. This editorial from Investor's Business Daily outlines the problem:
Dems Face Hard Choices After Hillary's Awful Book Tour Week If Hillary Clinton's much ballyhooed — and ultimately disastrous — national book tour is any indication, Democrats face some hard choices in the months ahead about whom they can run for president. You can't blame Clinton for scheduling her "Hillary Week" at a time when there was so much real news going on. But she certainly deserves blame for the fact that the only coverage she managed to get from her book tour was all bad.

Republican Lee Zeldin is running for congress in New York and is an Iraq War veteran. That didn't stop the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee from accusing Zeldin of being a coward. Alex Pappas of the Daily Caller reported:
In a post on its website, the campaign arm of the House Democrats is asking whether Republican Lee Zeldin is being cowardly about Republican Rep. Paul Ryan’s budget. “Over a month after his House Republicans passed Paul Ryan’s reckless budget, Congressional Candidate Lee Zeldin is still too scared to admit how he would vote for the plan, even though he wants Long Islanders to send him to Congress,” the DCCC said in a release. “Even though every member of Congress had no choice but to vote yes or no weeks ago, what’s taking him so long to decide? There’s only one answer: Zeldin is either woefully uninformed, willfully ignorant or a coward.”
Zeldin responded on FOX News. Comments and video via NewsBusters:
Well, you have some liberal Democrat hack who is hiding behind his Twitter account, stuffs his face with cheese doodles, sending out press releases on DCCC letterhead, shameful attacks. And the fact is Nancy Pelosi, Steve Israel, Tim Bishop, they've never served a day, and I think when I was sitting at the door on that Blackhawk and the drill master hits the back of your head, and you do what's so unnatural, jumping out with your parachute, here you are, fast forward to today and you have these Democratic hacks out of Washington who want to change the subject and fling insults, saying that I'm a coward. It just doesn't fit.
Here's the video: Democrats now are retreating from the claim, as reported at Newsday: